COP: Boca Woman Charged With DUI “Killed My Friend”

Leslie Socolov Killed Green Beret Richard Flaherty In 2015. She Was Charged With DUI In Boca Raton on Sunday.

BY: ANDREW COLTON | EDITOR AND PUBLISHER
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BOCA RATON, FL (BocaNewsNow.com) — Our reporting of the DUI arrest of Leslie Socolov early Sunday came as a shock to retired Aventura Police Officer David Yuzuk. Yuzuk was “on the job” when his friend — Green Beret Richard J. Flaherty — was struck and killed by a driver near the Aventura Mall. The driver was Leslie Socolov. It was May 9th, 2015.

Socolov, a transcriptionist for the Miami-Dade Police Department’s homicide division, was never charged. Under a controversial Florida law, prosecutors decided there was no case when she claimed she had no idea that she hit someone and continued on to her home to call her insurance company but not the police.

The man she killed was a homeless Vet often seen on the streets of Aventura and in the Aventura Mall.

“He was probably the most remarkable human being to walk the face of the earth,” said Ofc. Yuzuk to BocaNewsNow.com. “She got away with murder.”

Yuzuk said he befriended Capt. Flaherty while patrolling the streets of Aventura — but had no idea Flaherty was military until two weeks before his death. Flaherty was just 4-foot-7 — perhaps the least likely person to be a highly decorated member of the U.S. Armed Forces. But days before he was struck and killed by Socolov, Flaherty told his friend — Officer Yuzuk — who he really was.

“He was smallest man ever to serve in the US Military,” Yuzuk learned.
“He was a Green Beret and the recipient of several awards.”

But the truth Yuzuk learned after Flaherty’s brutal death was stranger than fiction. In the documentary Yuzuk produced about Flaherty and his death — “Giant Killer” — Flaherty is identified as a contractor for the NSA and CIA. He survived conflict and missions worldwide, only to be killed by a woman now living in Boca Raton.

“I don’t have a feeling good or bad about her arrest in Boca,” said Yuzuk. “Nothing will bring Richard back.”

Socolov was arrested in the 9100 block of Glades Road on Saturday evening, after she allegedly rammed her car into another car. According to the police report, Socolov got out of her vehicle — a 2015 Prius — and screamed, “Jew move your car” to the other driver.

Yuzuk says that car — the 2015 Prius — is likely the same car that Socolov drove when she struck Flaherty, then drove home.

The Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office arrested Socolov for DUI and disorderly conduct. She was released on her own recognizance early Sunday morning.

The documentary “Giant Killer” is available on Amazon Prime, as is the book. If the arrest report does not appear below, just click to read the full Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office affidavit.